


Nightcrawlers

by doieagenda



Series: halloween [2]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Bars and Clubs, Drinking, Drunk Doyoung, Fluff, Halloween, Haunted House, Kunten, Late night shenanigans, M/M, Strangers to Friends, possibly strangers to friends to lovers, this is because dotae is engaged
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:00:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26836342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doieagenda/pseuds/doieagenda
Summary: Doyoung never really wanted to go out on Halloween. His only plan was to one: binge watch American Horror Story and two: sleep through the several trick-or-treating children in his apartment complex. But nothing ever really goes to plan when you’re friends with Johnny, Ten, and Yuta.Somehow, he ends up drinking more than he can manage and dragging an innocent haunted house worker along in the chaos that is halloween night.
Relationships: Kim Dongyoung | Doyoung/Lee Taeyong
Series: halloween [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1957510
Comments: 3
Kudos: 75





	Nightcrawlers

**Author's Note:**

> Hello again! Like i've said if you read [my other halloween fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26744614) then you know that I really love halloween, so here is another one but dotae because they just announced their engagement awhile ago hehe. I really enjoyed writing this and it's the fastest I've written a fic ever. Anyway, this isn't associated to my other halloween fic and it stands on its own! You don't have to read the first one to understand this one :D

Doyoung never really wanted to go out on Halloween. His only plan was to one: binge watch American Horror Story and two: sleep through the several trick-or-treating children in his apartment complex. But nothing ever really goes to plan when you’re friends with Johnny, Ten, and Yuta. Somehow, on Halloween, he ended up in a club full of sweaty, drunk people who were all clad in these outrageously executed Halloween costumes. 

Yuta informed him just this afternoon that they’d be going out. Well, not informed, more like coerced him into going despite his several excuses not to. First of all, he didn’t even plan a costume this year since he was dead on having his AHS night but the Japanese man told him he can dress up in anything and it’d pass as a costume. 

Also, he’s too much of a homebody to enjoy being trapped in a sea of bodies jumping to some edm song.

“Loosen up, Doyo. It’s Halloween! You gotta enjoy yourself!” He enthuses to which Doyoung just replies with a grumpy huff.

Doyoung never really trusted him with things like this. There were already a lot of times wherein he was dragged into something like this and it always ends up with them passed out somewhere. Be it on the streets or someone else’s bed. He bets this one is no different. 

Forcing him to dress up as Lestat from Interview With A Vampire, Yuta—dressed as a wizard (Doyoung thinks) drags him to the club where they’ll all be doing their pre-game. Ten and his boyfriend Kun were already at a booth with their drinks. The Thai man, dressed as a creepy Mona Lisa hugs the both of them and invites them to sit. 

“Dongyoung! You came! I was starting to think you were rotting in your room or something,” Ten tells him, scooting over to let him sit. He sits down beside Ten and nods to Kun who was just smiling quietly beside Ten.

He looked so done with everything though, like he was forced to go here in that hilarious minion costume of his. Well, Doyoung and him aren’t so different after all.

“He already was. When I barged in, he was wrapped up in a blanket burrito.”

“It was comfy,” He defends. Both of them laugh, and Kun just chuckles.

Ten and Yuta started chattering animatedly about stuff(?) Doyoung doesn’t really think he could pay attention to it when the bass of the music is all he could hear and feel in his body. Ten hands him a shot and he downs it, earning a proud thumbs up from Yuta. The tequila immediately heats up his system and leaves a little burning sensation down his throat.

He thinks it’s their way of caring, so he’s not entirely mad. All 3 of his friends kept convincing him to go out but he always declined, not feeling any energy to do anything else but lay in bed all day, wallowing in the sadness that is his life. 

It’s not _that_ sad, he’s just being dramatic. Breaking up with his boyfriend of 5 years isn’t sad. He should suck it up. It’s been 2 months.

Who is he trying to kid? He’s been sad about it since it happened. So maybe he does need to loosen up.

Johnny arrives in the middle of Doyoung’s silent pity party, dressed up as Willy Wonka. 

“What did I miss?” He says, smiling charmingly. Everybody seemed excited now that everybody’s present. The real drinking started now that Johnny’s here.

To make everything more fun, Johnny suggested they play a game first to heat up their bodies before going to the dancefloor. Doyoung was very competitive when it came to drinking games… To any game actually. But his friends never really took him seriously. He didn’t really care about the game, he just wanted to win. 

But he kept on losing.

He looks at his three friends suspiciously when he lost the 5th round, feeling like they’re making him lose on purpose. 

“Why are you looking at us like that, Doyo?” Yuta taunts him. Keeping the same gaze on them, he downs the shot Ten prepared for him. Fortunately for him and unfortunately for everyone else, he has a really high alcohol tolerance, they’re not going to see him crawl anytime soon.

After what it seems like a hundred shots and a hundred losses, they all got bored of the game they were playing. Of course, Doyoung had to be the one to suffer the many losses. The game was a setup. Johnny suggests that they do 5 seconds from one bottle, just like what they did when they were in college. 

“C’mon guys, 10 seconds!”

“Yeah! If we’re gonna get hammered, let’s just go all the way,” Yuta adds.

Ten shakes his head and holds up a concerned hand, “that’s too long, John. We’re not in college anymore.”

“Damn, Kun you made him soft,” He whines jokingly, holding the bottle of tequila in his hands like it’s a prize to be won. Kun just laughs and jokingly punches Johnny’s shoulder.

“Okay, 5 seconds. Any objections?”

Doyoung shook his head, and mentally prepared himself for the trainwreck that’s going to ensue after all of this. He was already feeling a little lightheaded, but it’s fine. He can handle himself.

“Eldest first,” Doyoung grins, mischievously snatching the bottle from Johnny. The older wasn’t even phased as he tilted his head to receive his baptism.

Doyoung pours the liquor in his mouth while the others count to five. Johnny takes it in and winces at the lingering taste of alcohol in his mouth. Yuta followed, then Kun and suddenly it’s Doyoung’s turn to drink the alcoholic drink again.

Everyone starts the countdown but repeated “Three,” making Doyoung’s turn way longer than anyone else. After he is done, he whips his head to the one pouring the drink: Yuta. 

The Japanese man covered his face and looked at Ten in a slightly panicked manner. Johnny faces Ten too so he could receive his baptism too. Kun just sighs and pats Doyoung on the shoulder.

After everyone is done, Doyoung slaps all of their arms⏤ Except Kun, he’s an angel. He even wonders why Ten is with him⏤ and nags them for cheating.

“C’mon, Doyoung. You’ve been cooped up in your room because of what happened with Jaehyun. It would be nice to see you enjoy yourself,” Johnny tells him.

Enjoying is far from what this experience is, but he doesn’t exactly hate it. He doesn’t comment on that part but flinches when Johnny drops his ex’s name. 

“Johnny, I think you should censor the name,” Ten says, looking concerned at the way Doyoung suddenly froze. Johnny’s eyes widened and was quick to coddle him.

Doyoung brushes him off and smiles. Albeit a little sadly (obviously it’s about Jaehyun). “No, you’re right. I should enjoy myself. Who cares about Jaehyun. Right?” 

“Right,” Johnny says slowly, as if he didn’t just drop the J bomb on Doyoung. 

And enjoy he did, after another round of 5 second baptism, they all move on to the dancefloor where a remix of Thriller was being played. Everybody was jumping and having fun, and Doyoung can’t help but lose his inhibitions as well. He felt the alcohol ride up to his brain and it felt amazing. 

He came back to their booth and drank some of the tequila secretly while everybody was busy having their fun on the dancefloor. If he was going to have fun, might as well get shitfaced drunk while he’s at it. 

He’s already forgotten how fun it is to do this with his friends. They used to do this every week in college but then you know… Real life started to inch it’s way through everyone’s personal and private lives.

“Come on, Youngdo! Jump!” Yuta slurs, completely hyped and completely plastered already. 

Doyoung having already lost half of the remaining brain cell that he had to liquor, jumped so hard and the last thing he remembers is darkness.

* * *

**(5:00)**

When he wakes up, an unfamiliar face greets him with a very awkward, tight-lipped smile. He stretches and looks around to check where on Earth he ended up this time. He squints to cushion his eyes from the convenience store’s bright lights. 

“Hello?” The man, who was dressed up as a zombie, waves to him. He rubs his head and groans. 

“Here,” The guy hands him a bottle of hangover syrup. “I think you might need this.”

He grabs it, and winces at the pounding headache he is currently having. “Thanks,” he mumbles. They stay silent like that while Doyoung doesn’t even question why there’s a zombie man helping him with his hangover right now. 

“Have you sobered up now?” The guy asks. 

“I guess,” He answers, touching the nape of his neck. “Still not enough to question who you are and why we’re at a convenience store though.” 

“Oh.” 

“But seriously, who are you and why are we here?”

The guy chuckles and hands him a bottle of water. Doyoung gratefully takes it and chugs it down trying to flush out the alcohol in his system. 

He’s probably filled to the brim with liquor. But anyway, that’s not what’s important here. It’s the response from the guy that’s helping him. Or should he say his prince in shining...armor? Zombie?

“I’m Lee Taeyong and you were gonna pass out so I brought you here to sober up but you kinda fell asleep.” 

A silly blush creeps up on Doyoung’s cheeks and his ears, and he hopes Lee Taeyong won't notice. He knew this would happen, he really expected this to happen. At this point everything that happens when he goes clubbing with Yuta, Johnny and Ten is written in fate.

“Oh my god,” he whispers to himself, looking apologetically to Taeyong after. “I’m so sorry, I am such a stupid drunk.” 

“That must be a hell of a party then,” Taeyong chuckles. 

“You weren’t there?”

“What do you mean? I work at a haunted house, dude.” 

Doyoung blinks at him and opens his mouth to say something but ends up closing it due to the lack of things to say. Because honestly, what else can he say when he doesn’t remember what happened after he blacked out. 

**5 hours ago (00:00)**

“Yo, I told you this was gonna be so fun!” Yuta exclaims, jumping with each beat of the song. Doyoung grins for the first time that night and joins Yuta in jumping. 

“Yeah! Thanks a lot, Yuts!” He says. 

Ten and Kun join them. Johnny can’t even be found but no one dares question why anymore. Doyoung’s really feeling lightheaded, like everything around him is on a turntable. Or he was on a turntable, he’s quite unsure about it. 

He stumbles into a few people on his way back to the booth but he doesn’t forget his manners so he apologizes to them, even if it probably sounds unintelligible.

Johnny was there with a few people that Doyoung’s sure him and his friends don’t know. 

“Doyoung! Good thing you’re here!” Johnny says to him. He looks around and points to himself. “Yes you, you’re Doyoung.”

He giggles and plops down on the empty space between some guys he doesn’t know. “I am Doyoung.”

“These guys are Winwin and Jungwoo,” Johnny points to the two men who were beside Doyoung and he just giggles at them.

“They invited us to go to this haunted house and what’s amazing is that the proceeds go to a charity.”

Doyoung’s eyes widen and he stands suddenly, losing his sense of balance a little. He wobbly balances himself first before letting out a hiccup. “That’s good, right?”

The two men, Jungwoo and Winwin, nod to what Doyoung said. He bounces excitedly and tells Johnny he’ll go grab Ten, Yuta, and Kun. 

He slithers through the multitudes of people in the middle of the club before finding the trio. He eagerly tells them about the two people who invited them to the haunted house and everybody’s just too drunk to decline. 

The seven of them: Doyoung, Yuta, Johnny, Ten, Kun, Jungwoo, and Winwin, walked to the haunted house which was conveniently just a little walk away from the club. There wasn’t much of a line anymore, considering that it’s past children’s bedtimes and teens’ curfews, so it wasn’t much of a hassle for them to go in. 

Doyoung wasn’t a scaredy cat. Or so he’d like to think. Perhaps, he’d be less of a scaredy cat if he had someone to accompany him but they came in an odd number and he was the only one without a pair. He also was the last one to enter, so not only is he going to endure this on his own, he also has to face _all_ of his dumb friends after being scared shitless. 

He begrudgingly takes the first step in the haunted house and now he wants to back out. His mind isn’t even clear yet and he’s pretty sure he’s still intoxicated. He hiccups as he walks deeper into the dark place. 

“Hello?” He calls out, slowly turning his head to check if someone or something is going to jump scare him. An alarm suddenly blared and Doyoung’s brain went into a frenzy of panicked thoughts. 

He runs to the nearest entrance and bumps into a ghost who went all up in his business. He carefully pushed it away but was greeted with poppers on the floor which honestly scared the shit out of him. 

“Fucking shit! I hate it here!” He cries out, hands stretched out as some kind of defense tactic. Another ghost greets him and warns him of the things yet to come in this house. 

“Are you going to kill me?” He asks, carefully stepping away. 

“We might, if you fail to exit this house,” The ghost says to him which makes his legs tremble even more. 

Doyoung stumbles a little bit trying to run straight, but he’s still a little drunk so he bumps into another person trying to scare him. They fall⏤ not so graciously⏤ on top of each other and Doyoung hiccups again. 

The red LED lights in the room quickly illuminates the body Doyoung toppled over. Shit, he thinks he killed him.

“Oh my god, are you dead? Did I kill you?” Doyoung asks, almost in a cry. The zombie groans and slowly stands up. 

“I thought I really killed you,” He whispers, forgetting that he has to exit the house or else he’d end up dead just like what the second ghost warned him. 

Suddenly the lights flicker and it all turns dark. He screams and grabs the person near him and drags him to where he needed to be. The zombie groans but he can’t wriggle out of Doyoung’s tight grip. 

“Excuse me, I-” The zombie tries but Doyoung can’t hear anything else beside his screams and the blare of the siren. They encounter a deadend and another zombie comes up near them. 

Doyoung closes his eyes and ducks, using the person he’s holding as a shield against the zombie trying to attack me.

“Please don’t kill me!” Doyoung yowls as he runs, still dragging the person he bumped into earlier. 

“Sir, excuse me I-” 

Something drops from the ceiling, surprising Doyoung. He secures his grip on the person’s shirt and tries to calm himself. Behind the giant spider that dropped, a big ‘EXIT’ sign is greeting him. He hiccups and runs toward the end with hopes of seeing his friends. The ghost from earlier chases him out and he staggers towards the exit, pulling the person he’s been dragging.

“Johnny and Yuta you son of bitches! Why’d you left-” He starts but stopped when he realized no one was there greeting him. Or laughing at him. Or waiting for him. 

He looks around and sees that no one else is there beside him and the zombie. Doyoung turns his head sadly to the zombie who was just rubbing his arm who was tightly gripped by him for at least ten minutes. 

“They left me,” He whimpers. Normally, it’d be okay. But Doyoung downed so much alcohol tonight that he can’t help but cry pathetically about his friends leaving him. “They really fucking left me!”

He sits down and cries. He can’t even stop it, he’s just very dizzy and he has no friends. The zombie crouches beside him and awkwardly pats his back. 

“How could they leave me behind? They’re just like Jaehyun,” Doyoung slurs, head falling from how heavy it feels. The zombie stands him up and wipes his tears with his flannel. 

“I think we need a walk,” The guy says. Doyoung nods, frowning a little. 

He holds Doyoung’s hand comfortingly, and they walk to the ticket booth. The zombie tells Doyoung to wait there as he sprints to the ticket booth and tells the guy there whose name is ‘Taeil’ as indicated by his tag that he’s going to end his shift now. Taeil asks and he nods to Doyoung whose eyes and head are falling from feeling too heavy. 

The zombie⏤ whose name isn’t made known to Doyoung yet⏤ nudges him a little and he trips over his feet. 

“Come on, there’s a park near here.”

Doyoung nods, hiccuping for the thousandth time that night. The zombie just chuckles as he assisted Doyoung in walking straight.  
  


**Present (5:25)**

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Doyoung gawks as Taeyong finishes his story. He drops his head to the table in shame and bangs it several times hoping it could cure his stupidity. Taeyong laughs and runs his hand through his hair a little too attractively. 

“Did I really grip you that tight?” Doyoung asks, cringing at himself. 

“Yeah, I couldn’t escape you.”

Doyoung bangs his head on the table again but is surprised when Taeyong puts his hand there to stop him from doing it.

“Don’t cushion it, my brain needs to learn.”

“You know, you were drunk. It happens.” Taeyong shrugs. Doyoung takes one good look at him and wonders why he didn’t leave him there to cry pitifully. Godsent honestly.

“Doesn’t mean I could act all stupid. Sorry for ruining your night,” Doyoung bows apologetically. Taeyong laughs and waves his hand, trying to tell him it’s okay.

“No, it’s fine. It seems like you have a lot going on,” He says, making Doyoung blush. “You weren’t the worst, believe it or not. At least you didn’t punch me in the face.”

Doyoung laughs and blushes even more, “Did that really happen to you?”

Taeyong smiles and nods, looking like he was recalling how it happened. “The other night, there was this lady who was more scared than you, she punched me square on the jaw.” 

Doyoung laughs again and looks at where Taeyong is pointing on his face. And wow, he has a really handsome jawline. 

Actually, he has a really handsome face. Doyoung didn’t even notice until he took all the prosthetics off. He’d probably be more attractive without all that makeup.

“Holy shit,” Doyoung whispers when he realizes how good looking Taeyong is. He embarrassed himself in front of a handsome stranger. 

“What?”

“Nothing, I just- my head isn’t that clear yet,” Doyoung tells him, hiding his embarrassment behind a silly blush.

“Oh, you want to talk about everything else?” 

“What do you mean by everything else?” Doyoung asks, slowly. Taeyong fiddles with the hem of his flannel and shrugs.

“You told me everything about you, dude. I know you like myself now and we only just met.”

Doyoung groans and slaps his face, “What did I tell you?”

**4 hours ago (1:00)**

Taeyong doesn’t know why he’s helping this guy who introduced himself as Doyoung. It seemed as if he was going through a rough patch in his life and he reeked of alcohol. Good thing he’s over with his shift or he would have been guilty leaving a guy like this crying like that behind. 

“Kind stranger, why are you helping me?” He asks. Taeyong sighs and shrugs.

“I don’t know you seem like you need company.”

Doyoung hums, lost in thought as they walk through the brisk air of fall. “I do think,” hiccup “I need the company, thanks.” 

“Do you wanna talk about it?” 

“No,” He mutters but decides against it, because why the hell not? “Actually yes.”

Him and Taeyong arrive at the playground and then like any cliche scene that plays out in life, they sit on the swings to talk about their f word.

“Feelings,” Doyoung starts. Yes, that f word.

“What?”

“I hate talking about them.”

“Oh, you don’t need to tell me if you feel like that,” Taeyong tells him kindly. He shakes his head and continues. 

“But I’ll tell you everything, you seem like you got your life together.” 

“Thanks, I guess,” Taeyong muses. 

“Anyway, first question. Do you think I’m pathetic for still being sad about a breakup that happened 2 months ago?”

Taeyong shakes his head and looks at Doyoung who’s just kicking pebbles near his feet. “Not at all. People move on at their own pace.”

“I feel like I’m pathetic though. Like I’m in a constant battle with myself because I feel like I’m not moving on like he is,” He rambles, laughing bitterly. “We were together for 5 years and then suddenly he wasn’t sure about me anymore.”

“Oh,” was all Taeyong could reply. Doyoung’s head feels ten times heavier than it was before, as if his skull was damp and the wet weight is pulling it down. He tries his best to sit straight so he doesn’t fall face flat to the ground, embarrassing himself further. 

“I found out that he’s dating someone new? I think my friend Yuta told me. I don’t care, at least I’m pretending not to.” 

“You can care, you were with him for 5 years.”

“I kept ignoring everything related to him because I feel like I’d fall apart and crumble once I get reminded of him again. Stupid me. But then even if I ignore him, he remains in my mind it’s like… I don’t know. ”

“You’re not stupid,” Taeyong assures. “You can’t always be on top of what you feel, Doyoung.”

He nods and proceeds to tell Taeyong more about his feelings: how he thinks his friends can never understand what goes on in his mind but that’s also partly his fault when he keeps most of those things to himself. How he thinks he can never learn to love himself and other people just like when he was with Jaehyun or if he’s still going to move on from that part of his life. They stay like that for a while with Doyoung word vomiting on Taeyong all the things he won’t ever say out loud and Taeyong listening to him, adding comments of his own. 

“I drank so much tonight, why did I think it would help me forget,” Doyoung laughs. “You know what, I want some beer.”

“But you’re already so drunk,” Taeyong points out, earning a roll of eyes from Doyoung.

“Come on, don’t be a stick in the mud,” He tells Taeyong who was just indecisively looking at Doyoung. “I’ll let you rant to me too. Please.”

“Fine.”

**Present (5:50)**

“For what it’s worth, I think you really needed to vent all of that out,” Taeyong tells him truthfully. Doyoung lowers his head from humiliation. Him and his dumb mouth. 

“I don’t do that normally.” 

“I know, you told me. It’s not gonna do you any good to keep all that inside of you, Doyoung.”

“What are you? A therapist?” Doyoung chuckles, genuinely curious about Taeyong now that he knows almost everything about Doyoung now. 

“Actually, I am.”

Doyoung chokes on his own spit and looks at Taeyong to check if he was kidding. 

He wasn’t 

“Wait, for real?” He asks again. Taeyong nods and crosses his arms across his chest. 

“Then what are you doing working in a haunted house?” 

“It’s for charity.” 

Doyoung grins on the inside, thinking about how good-hearted Taeyong is, he helps a drunk man crying about his ex and friends on halloween, bought him hangover medicine, listened to his troubles. Now, he volunteers in haunted houses for charity? He must be unreal. Not to mention, he’s so hot too. 

Doyoung needs to keep it together. After tonight, they probably won’t even meet up which saddens him more than he expects.

“You drink too much, you should watch that by the way,” Taeyong quips. Doyoung laughs and shakes his head.

“This is the first time I’ve drank this much in months!” Doyoung defends and it’s true! The last time they drank was Jaehyun and his joint birthday party back in february. 

“You had like 7 cans of beer.”

**3 hours ago (2:00)**

“Why are you buying so much beer?” Taeyong asks him, slightly concerned about the bulk of beer in their basket.

“I need it for self-care.”

“I don’t think that’s self-care.”

Doyoung waves him off with an unconcerned hand and takes some beef jerky, adding it to their basket. “Your self-care must be different from mine, I get beer when I’m happy.”

“So you’re happy right now?” Taeyong asks, a small smile gracing his face. 

“I’m trying to be, you’re actually helping me,” Doyoung tells him. Wow, where’d he get this courage from?

“Cool.”

They cash out their beers and jerky and bring it back to the swings where they hung out a while ago. Doyoung sighs and opens a can of beer. 

“Should we become friends?” He asks Taeyong, who was opening a can of beer too. 

“Sure, why not?”

“Cool.”

“Cool.”

Doyoung leans his head against the rope of the swing and sighs again. He takes a sip of his beer and watches as cars pass by them.

“What are you dressed up as by the way?” Taeyong asks him. 

“Me? I’m Lestat from Interview with a vampire,” Doyoung tells him, looking down on his soiled clothes. “Is it not obvious?”

“I don’t know that.”

“It’s fine, the book was totally boring, even the movie,” Doyoung tells him. “I wasn’t even planning on celebrating halloween this year.”

“Why?”

“I always celebrated it with Jaehyun. My friends dragged me out of the house to celebrate with them though.”

“Is that a good thing?”

“I guess? I wouldn’t even be out here with you if they didn’t,” Doyoung tells him. Taeyong blushes and avoids Doyoung’s gaze. 

They both take a swig of their beers as they fall into a comfortable silence.

“Thanks for staying with me,” Doyoung says. 

“Anytime.”

**1 and half hours ago (3:30)**

“Doyoung, come on. One foot after the other,” Taeyong tells him, holding him gently. Doyoung giggles and totters impishly away from Taeyong who was already struggling to carry him because of how frail his body is. 

“Taeyong, you’re quite weak,” Doyoung teases, leaning more of his weight against Taeyong. 

“I know, if only you listened to me about not drinking more when you were already drunk, we wouldn’t be in this position,” Taeyong nags him, still scraffling to balance Doyoung on his side. 

“You nag too much, that’s supposed to be my job,” Doyoung pouts. Taeyong sighs and patiently holds the boy next to him. Doyoung carefully places his head on his shoulder. 

“Head too heavy,” he mumbles. Taeyong grins and feels his heartbeat pick up its pace. 

“Probably because of that big brain of yours.”

“Thanks, big brain? Should we weigh my head?”

“No, that’s too much work. It’s probably like 10 kilos,” Taeyong jokes, finding it easier to make Doyoung walk if he’s talking. 

“Yours must be just 7 then.”

“Probably,” Taeyong jokes. “You’re doing so good right now, Doyoung. That’s correct! Left foot and then right foot.”

“That’s Doyoung. I’m walking,” Doyoung slurs. Taeyong looks at him again and bites his lip to hide the smile fighting its way out of his face. Doyoung’s cheeks are so red right now and his eyes are half open right now. 

They arrive at a pharmacy and Taeyong sits the drunk boy down on the senior citizen seats. He closed his eyes for a bit and said he’ll wait for Taeyong like a good boy.

Taeyong wanted to kiss his cheeks, and tell him that he is very good. Very cute and nice. But of course, he couldn’t. They just met tonight, it hasn't been 12 hours yet. 

He buys the hangover syrup and aspirin, and taps Doyoung awake. The drunk boy whines but complies nonetheless, putting an arm around Taeyong. 

They walk to a convenience store and Taeyong thinks they could spend their time there sobering up. 

Well, sobering Doyoung up. 

He goes and buys water inside, worriedly looking at Doyoung who was just napping outside, trying to see if someone is mugging him. He hastily goes to sit with Doyoung and stares at him for a while. 

“Totally not creepy at all, Lee Taeyong,” He scolds himself, and looks elsewhere trying to think about how his night turned out like this. 

“Zombie guy is nice,” Doyoung murmurs. Taeyong jumps a little in his seat to check if he was awake, but he wasn’t. Just sleep talking. 

He smiles and replies, “Zombie guy thinks you’re nice too.”

**Present (6:00)**

“Thanks for, you know,” Doyoung says shyly, his cheeks burning up. “Everything.”

“It’s no problem,” Taeyong smiles. They walk to where Doyoung was living, which was surprisingly also near where Taeyong lives. It’s a wonder why they don’t bump into each other as much.

Kidding, Doyoung doesn’t really go out of the house as often. Perhaps that’s why.

Nearing the complex, they see two bodies sprawled across the entrance of the building. Taeyong apprehensively looks at Doyoung who just groaned at the sight in front of them. He kicks the two men awake and they instantaneously awaken. 

“Get up, losers. You owe me something,” Doyoung grumbles. Johnny and Yuta grimace at their probable headache and hangover. They stand and Doyoung just looks at them sternly, like he was waiting for an explanation.

“We didn’t mean it, Doyo.”

“Yeah, we genuinely forgot about how you went there alone. So we went back to get you but you weren’t at the haunted house anymore. We waited all night here,” Johnny explains. “But I’m guessing you had company?”

Taeyong purses his lips and pretends he wasn’t just acknowledged by Doyoung’s tall and scary friend. 

“I did, better company than you guys.” 

Taeyong wanted to excuse himself from them, he sticks out like a sore thumb but Doyoung pulls him closer to him.

“This is Taeyong, and he’s going to go on a date with me next weekend,” Doyoung declares, startling both Taeyong and his friends. 

“What?” All three of them say at the same time. 

“You heard me, Lee Taeyong. You are going on a date with me next weekend.” 

“You demand too much of me, Kim Doyoung,” Taeyong teases. Doyoung blushes and shys away a bit, pulling him farther from his prying friends. 

“Please? So I can repay you for taking care of me all night?” 

Taeyong feigned like he was mulling it over, but he’s certain about what he’ll answer Doyoung. He grins and nods his head. 

“Sure, as long as it’s better than the convenience store and the park,” He teases again. Doyoung ducks his head down and bites his lower lip. 

“Cool,” he utters. “May I also have your number?”

Taeyong indulged him and they exchanged numbers, bidding each other goodbye after with a slightly clumsy hug. Feeling a little empty about saying their temporary farewells, he watches Taeyong’s retreating figure and thinks about the whole serendipitous encounter between the two of them. 

He sprints back to Yuta and Johnny who were waiting for him still outside the building. 

“Dude, what happened to you last night?” Johnny asks him, noticing the silly smile on his face. 

“It’s kind of a long story.”

**Author's Note:**

> You can reach and dm me on my [twitter](https://twitter.com/saddermachine)! Let's support NCT 2020!!


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